Filia Tempus
by The Fourth Bride
Summary: The events in the Crucible had a slightly different outcome, and life for the Doctor and Donna Noble will never be the same. But that's the least of their worries. Unashamed fixit for JE and TDD. Whump, noncon and angst abound, as well as some pretty gruesome villains. You have been warned.
1. Chapter 1

Jenny sat in the corner of the room, hunched, shivering and naked on the cold concrete floor. The only illumination came in the form of a narrow beam which streamed in through a tiny window placed high in one of the stone walls. Even this meagre light lasted for only a few hours each morning- well, she called it morning, since they always came for her when the light was at its peak.

The sun had shone through the window fifteen times since she had first woken in the room.

Now, she noticed the angle of that one beam of light changing gradually until it shone almost directly down on her. Her pulse quickened and her stomach roiled in fear.

They would come soon.

She curled further in on herself as she heard the creaking of the stubborn hinges on the heavy door, trying desperately to hide her fear. Heavy footsteps moved across the room towards her. She clenched her fists and struggled to regulate her breathing.

The light from the window glowed red through her eyelids as she deliberately tried to ignore sensation of their hands on her body.

Hours later, she lay battered and bleeding in the darkness, and only one though occupied her mind as she slipped slowly into blissful oblivion.

"Daddy"

In a comfortably appointed parlour, lit by the warm glow of an open fire sat two figures that could have been called human, except that they weren't.

The larger of the two stood at nearly seven feet tall, with closely cropped dark hair and sloping shoulders. Any resemblance he bore to a human man ended there. In the place of eyes, he had a pair of mismatched gashes, each held open with crude stitches to reveal glittering black points embedded in mangled flesh which shone with a cruel intelligence. His 'mouth' was a similar gash, this one twisted in a permanent grotesque sneer, made all the more horrifying by the pointed teeth which jutted disturbingly over the bottom 'lip'. Where the nose should have been, there were instead two slightly flared slits, not unlike a snakes.

The second figure certainly looked more human than his companion, until you noticed his eyes. They were large, bulbous and yellow. Not human eyes with yellow irises, but blankly staring globes the colour of rancid butter. He was much shorter than the other creature, standing only five feet tall when he was feeling particularly optimistic. He also had dark hair, however his was slicked back and thinning at the front.

For all their differences, both figures exuded identical auras of smug self-satisfaction.

"Well my friend, we've finally done it. How does it feel?" The shorter man spoke jovially. His grotesque friend bared his teeth in a twisted approximation of a smile.  
"Feels...good. Proud." The creatures voice was slow and measured, with a slight hissing tone and a disturbing touch of malevolence.

"Good, good." The shorter man stood with his his hands clasped behind his back and bounced on the balls of his feet. "What do you say, Phobos, fancy a drink?"

Phobos grunted in approval. "Sounds...good...boss."

Jenny paced worriedly around the perimeter of her cell, cold, hungry and decidedly unsettled. The prior two conditions she was accustomed to, but the third was a new development. Her captors had failed to arrive in over two days. The first day, she had felt nothing but an incredible sense of relief when, after waiting in terror for over an hour, she had realized that they weren't coming. On the second day, she had begun to worry that they were only ignoring her in preparation for some new torment.

This morning, she had felt something change.

She wasn't sure what it was, or indeed, how she knew about it, but something was different. There was a tension in the air, an intangible frission of energy that made it impossible for her to lie or sit passively as she had been for days. Something was coming.

Just as the thought occurred to her, she heard an odd squeaking noise, accompanied by the familiar tramp of heavy boots outside the door. She whimpered involuntarily and ran to the corner, as though she could hide from them in the shadows.

The door creaked open and she saw that the odd squeaking noise was made by a stainless steel gurney being wheeled into the room by the tall, hulking man whose grotesque excuse for a face haunted her dreams each night. His odious little yellow-eyed companion soon followed, wearing an odd little grin.

"Well now my sweet, we've finally succeeded. Do you know what that means?"

Mute with terror, Jenny simply shook her head.

The man's grin widened. "It means, sweetling, that my experiment is complete. It means that my friend here will be the first of many. It means, my dear, that you are finally pregnant."

Donna and the Doctor sat curled up on a large, squashy couch in the TARDIS library, their silence broken only by the soft humming of the ship around them.

"Well then." Donnas tone was one of blank shock.

"Yeah." The Doctor, by contrast, sounded faintly disbelieving.

"That was..."

"I know."

They continued to sit in silence for a few minutes, thinking back on the events of the day.

It had started off as a regular day for the duo, with a hearty breakfast (prepared by Donna), a set of random co-ordinates entered into the TARDIS navigation systems and the usual corrupt government to overthrow. Just another day at the office.

And then Donna had been shot.

The Doctor shivered slightly as he recalled the look of sheer astonishment on her face as she crumpled to the ground. He remembered screaming her name and running to catch her before she hit the concrete (what was it with warehouses?). Then, impossibly, her hands had started to radiate with a gentle golden light. The Doctor had scrambled backwards, exclaiming "What!?" in disbelief. He knew that she had absorbed some of his genetic material as well as his memories during the metacrisis - that was what had saved her mind from burning up - but this should never have been possible.

Evidently, however, it was possible, and although he had grimaced in sympathy when she shrieked in pain as the fires of regeneration consumed her, he found himself grinning widely at the thought that _Donna_ might be able to stay with him for longer than thirty or forty more years.

This had been confirmed when they had returned to the TARDIS, Donna leaning heavily on the Doctor as she struggled to remain conscious. They had headed straight for the medbay, anxious to determine exactly what had happened to Donna. What the scans had revealed had shocked them into their current state of stunned-mullet silence. It seemed that, when Donna had touched the Doctors old hand she had not only absorbed his memories and enough genetic information to make her brain compatible with them, but also the four additional chromosome sets containing the necessary information to facilitate regeneration. The upshot of this was that Donna was now a fully-functioning Time Lady, complete with second heart and respiratory bypass system.

Settling back into the couch a little, the Doctor snuck a quick glance at her, to find her staring determinedly in the opposite direction. He wondered when he had started sneaking glances at his best friend. That didn't seem like a particularly 'matey' thing to do. Now that he thought about it, things between them had been different ever since they had left Rose in the alternate universe with his duplicate. Since their telepathic link had been functioning at full capacity at the time, she had known full well that his story about the duplicate being dangerous was a ruse. The three of them had worked it out wordlessly whilst they were towing the Earth back into its proper orbit. The Doctor had realized right away that Rose's tale about the dimension cannon 'just starting to work' conveniently in time for the collapse of the multiverse was most likely missing a few vital details, and that whatever remained of his feelings for her had vanished when Donna had told him about what happened in the universe created by the time beetle. He could not in good conscience love someone who thought nothing of tearing his ship apart to serve her own selfish purposes, not to mention her callous attitude toward Donna as she lay dying.

Understanding this, the duplicate Doctor created by the metacrisis had offered to stay with Rose in the parallel universe to discourage her from using the dimension cannon again, as they were quite certain that it was what had caused much of the preliminary damage to the walls between the worlds. Donna and the original Doctor had agreed, but only after he had pointed out that there was really nothing for him in this universe. Donna and the Doctor had each other, and he was not quite their child and not quite their brother- an aberration. Although they vehemently disagreed with that statement, they accepted that he would rather make a new start for himself than live in their shadows.

Since then, Donna and the Doctor had resumed their old lifestyle, running and laughing together. But something indiscernible had changed between them. They had always been a bit familiar for people who were 'just friends', but now their hugs lasted just a fraction of a second longer, and they often found themselves holding hands when there was no running to be done at all. There were glances, stolen and fleeting, which left them looking away from each other and blushing furiously. Things were different, and...he found that he liked it.

Cautiously, he flicked another look in her direction, but this time he was surprised to catch her looking at him, with a speculative expression he was sure was mirrored on his own face. They sat like that, frozen, for a few seconds and then they were kissing, feverishly and without reserve and alright, _fine_, maybe he did want a bit more than just a mate.


	2. one and a half- the missing scene

After five solid minutes of passionate snogging (this respiratory bypass thing could prove to be very useful, Donna reflected), she reluctantly disengaged her mouth from the Doctor's, ignoring his noise of disappointment.

"Doctor."

"Hmm?"

She grabbed his hands as they tried to slip under her top.

"Doctor. Stop it. If we're going to do this I think we should talk first. I haven't... I need to know how different this is going to be from human sex."

He sat up, pulling back from her a little.

"It's not, really. All the er, parts go together the same way."

Donna sensed that he was leaving something out.

"But?"

"_But- _and I'm not sure that this is even something we have to think about right now- Gallifreyan reproduction is significantly different from what you're used to."

Of course.

"In what way?" Donna asked somewhat apprehensively, hoping to god that he wasn't about to reveal that the males of her new species carried the young. Some things, in her opinion, were best left to seahorses and bad science fiction.

"Well, we're not, strictly speaking, mammalian- despite evidence to the contrary." He glanced conspicuously at her chest, "I mean, infants _are_ fed in much the same way, but... the thing is... we're kind of... oviparous."

"English, Spaceman."

He took a breath and said very quickly, "Donnawelayeggs."

Her eyes grew round and her hand drifted unconsciously upwards in preparation for a slap.

"Sorry. Did you say _eggs_?"

He nodded, looking fearfully at her raised hand.

Donna sighed and lowered her hand.

"Don't look at me like that; I'm not going to hit you. It's hardly your fault."

The Doctor visibly relaxed.

"Having second thoughts then?"

"No. Yes. I don't know!" She ran a hand down her face in frustration, "I want this, I want _you,_ but..."

She tried again, "It's not just the egg thing, although that is, admittedly, pretty weird. It's- oh, Christ, this is embarrassing- I haven't actually had sex in almost twenty years, and even then it was never good."

She wrung her hands self-consciously and avoided his eyes, "I'm not sure I'd be able to see it through, so to speak."

The Doctors mouth dropped open in shock.

"That's what you're worried about? That _I'll_ end up frustrated?"

He reached out and gently gripped her shoulders.

"Donna, I am so sorry that you were ever treated as though you were anything less that supremely important, but please, _please_ believe me when I say that I want nothing more than for you to be happy. We don't have to have sex if the idea frightens you or makes you uncomfortable. Whatever you decide, I... I love you."

Stunned by the magnitude of his declaration, Donna responded in the only way she could think of. She kissed him again, hard and heated, all clashing teeth and warring tongues. Almost of its own volition, her hand slid up his inner thigh to brush against the bulge of his rapidly growing erection. He made a desperate little noise in the back of his throat and pushed her off, the suction of their lips breaking with a wet pop. They were both breathing heavily, with their faces flushed and their pupils dilated.

Catching his breath, the Doctor spoke, "Donna, are you _sure_?"

Donna closed her eyes briefly before replying, "I... I'm sure. I _want_ to. But... I'm still scared. I shouldn't be. I know you won't hurt me, but I still... Argh! I don't know!"

The Doctor sat thoughtfully for a minute before saying, "I have a suggestion, if you'd like to hear it."

"Alright then."

"We could- if it would make you more comfortable, we could make tonight just about you. Let me learn you, your body, your responses. Let me show you that this can be safe, that you can enjoy yourself without worrying about me."

Donna fidgeted nervously, but she couldn't deny that she found the thought of his hands on her body with no intentions other than bringing her pleasure incredibly arousing. She took a deep breath and, releasing it in a gusty sigh, made her decision.

"Okay."

The Doctor smiled, incredibly happy at this proof that she felt comfortable enough with him to allow this.

"If you want me to stop, just say so and I will, I promise."

"I believe you."

He gave her a gentle, lingering kiss before picking her up and walking across the room to lay her down on the thick, fluffy rug in front of the fire she could have sworn hadn't been lit five minutes ago. Once she was comfortably reclined, the Doctor set about divesting her of her clothing, peppering each and every inch of skin he bared with feather-light kisses. Finally, Donna lay naked on the rug, feeling pleasantly warm and tingly as the Doctor used his teeth and tongue to work her nipples into aching, hardened peaks.

Eventually, he pulled away from her breasts, releasing her right nipple with a wet popping noise. He grinned at her, looking thoroughly pleased with himself.

"You have no idea how long I've wanted to do that to you."

She snorted derisively.

"Oh, go on with you, you liar."

"No, really Donna! Even before, when we were just friends, I couldn't very well deny that you were beautiful, that I found you attractive."

Suddenly feeling self-conscious, Donna sat up and pulled her knees to her chest, wrapping her arms around them.

"Stop it, Doctor. You don't have to do that, you don't have to say those things. I know I'm well past my sell-by date, and I was never much to look at anyway."

The Doctor growled.

"Donna Noble, you are beautiful and amazing and sexy, and if you won't believe me then I'll just have to show you!"

Gently pushing her back into a horizontal position, he resumed his oral investigation of her breasts, before moving gradually lower, kissing and licking his way down her abdomen. He lingered for a while at her navel, flicking his tongue into it before moving on. She shivered and tensed slightly when he gently nipped the sensitive skin near the crease of her groin. He stilled and raised his head.

"Are you alright? Do you want me to stop?"

Deliberately relaxing her muscles, Donna answered, "No. I'm fine, go ahead."

The Doctor looked doubtful.

"If you're sure…"

"I am. Please, Doctor, keep going."

Thus reassured, he continued his path down her right thigh until he reached her knee. Once there, he brought his hands into play, using his long, slender fingers to tickle the delicate skin at the backs of her knees until she writhed in frustration. Once he was confident that she was ready, the Doctor repositioned himself so that he was kneeling on the rug at Donna's feet with his hands delicately poised on her knees.

Donna gasped in a breath as the Doctor bent her knees and gently pushed her legs apart, exposing her heated core. No one had ever paid such avid attention to her needs, and she found it incredibly exciting. Murmuring soft reassurances, he trailed a fingertip along her inner thigh, before lightly stroking the crease of her groin.

Moving to lie on his stomach between her splayed legs, the Doctor used the fingers of his left hand to separate the folds of her labia, eliciting a delicious sound of anticipation from his lover. Smirking self-assuredly, he bent to his task.

Donna squeaked in surprise when her lover pinched her swollen clit, causing her to buck and writhe helplessly under his hands. Giving her no time to recover, he circled her entrance with a fingertip before slowly inserting the finger into her as she pulsated wildly around him. She moaned lowly as he withdrew his hand and then pushed it back into her, agonizingly slowly. She expected him to add another finger in the typical male belief that size was more important than skill, but he never did, continuing to thrust the single digit into her heat, changing his angle every so often to press against something inside her that made her hips buck wildly and her stomach muscles clench.

Finally- _finally, _he lowered his head and began to lick languidly at her clit whilst thrusting a little faster with his hand, and she was sent screaming, spiralling into orgasm.


	3. Champagne and Mysteries

Phobos sat, hunched over slightly, in the armchair that the boss had given him by the fire. He was thinking hard, an exercise to which he was unaccustomed and which caused his misshapen face to contort grotesquely. He had been pleased when the boss had shown him the reading on the funny little machine and told him that it meant the girl was carrying his child. He had felt as though he had accomplished something. But now he felt restless and dissatisfied, he could barely stay still in his chair, jiggling his legs rapidly up and down.

Slowly, it began to dawn on him that he missed her. He missed the feel of her pinned beneath him, struggling fruitlessly. He missed sinking his jagged nails into her breasts and listening to her scream. He missed the heat of her around his cock and the wild hammering of her pulse. But most of all, he missed the look of pure terror in her eyes, written on her every feature when she looked at him, when he took her. Smirking a bit in remembrance, he resolved to ask the boss if he could continue to play with her. Having made his decision, Phobos grunted softly, leaned back in the chair and began to snore, worn out by the effort of so much complex thought.

She couldn't move. Something was holding her down.

These were Jenny's first thought as she struggled blearily back into consciousness. Forcing her uncooperative brain into gear, she strained against the mental fog, trying desperately to remember what had happened to her. Suddenly, a barrier within her mind seemed to crumble and everything came rushing back to her. The cell, with its tiny window, her grotesque tormentors. And the parasite.

At first, the explanation given by the short man known universally as 'the boss' had made no sense to her. She had no idea what 'pregnant' meant, or why it should meant that they had succeeded at anything. She hadn't felt any different. She hadn't thought that she looked any different. For a few days she had put it from her mind and simply enjoyed the peace. She was no longer violated daily; they had given her a blanket and best of all she was being fed well and regularly.

Then, she had felt something inside her move. It had felt different from the familiar movement of her stomach growling in demand of food; this had felt almost... alive.

She had panicked. There was something alive, something _growing_ inside her, feeding on her blood or her organs or _something_ and it frightened her. She had screamed, cried and scraped and pounded at the door until her nails tore and her knuckles bled.

They had come, finally, rushing through the door so unexpectedly that she was knocked backwards a few paces. The taller one, who she had heard the other one call 'Phobos' had grabbed her and used one hand to restrain her arms, whilst the other grasped her hair and pulled her head to one side to expose her throat. The shorter, yellow eyed one had darted forward and jabbed something into the side of her neck. She had continued to struggle for another few minutes before her vision had blurred and she had faded from consciousness.

Now, as she battled her way through the last vestiges of the drug induced haze, she realized that she lay naked, strapped to a cold, hard exam bed in a sterile, blindingly white room.

She raised her head to look down at herself and saw, to her horror that her belly had started to swell. The thing was growing larger. She shuddered involuntarily when she wondered what would happen when it became too large to fit inside her.

Squeezing her eyes shut against the tears that threatened to fall, she sent out a silent prayer to whoever was listening that her father would find her before it was too late.

Donna laughed delightedly as the Doctor seized her by the waist and spun her around the dance floor with reckless abandon. Her laughter became a shriek when he wrapped his arms around her and dipped her low to the ground.

"Stop it, you bloody idiot! You'll do your back in carrying around a great lump like me!"

The Doctor smiled and scooped her off her feet completely.

"You, my lady, are the furthest thing from a lump that I have ever seen."

She whapped him lightly on the arm.

"Flatterer! Now, put me down so I can get us some more champagne. I tell you, Spaceman, I am loving this new metabolism."

The new couple were attending an illicit party in Boston, 1928, in honour of their first kiss in the kitchens of Edison manor. The gathering was being held in celebration of one Mr Reginald Barton's engagement. Neither Donna nor the Doctor had any idea who Mr Barton was, but judging by his ballroom he was doing quite well for himself. The richly appointed space featured polished Maplewood floors and a stunningly gaudy crystal chandelier. A small orchestra occupied one corner, filling the air with lively jazz music. Along the far wall was a long, low trestle heaped with fresh fruit and sweetmeats, champagne bottles and decanters of smuggled whiskey. All in all, it was, as Donna put it, a 'proper bash'.

The Doctor smiled softly as his eyes tracked his mates swaying hips as she crossed the room to the buffet table. She really was beautiful; he had no idea why she couldn't see it herself. The other men surrounding them certainly did. He found himself suppressing a growl as he watched them blatantly ogling_ his_ Donna.

Taking a slow, deep breath to prevent his bypass from activating out of stress, he closed his eyes and exhaled, deliberately relaxing his muscles. He didn't want Donna to worry over nothing. He certainly didn't want to have to explain to her his rapidly developing jealous streak. It was irrational, chauvinistic, and he was fairly certain she would slap him for it.

Donna returned bearing two brimming champagne flutes and sporting a saucy grin. As she handed the Doctor his glass, she leaned in close to him so that her breasts pressed invitingly against his chest.

"Well old man, what do you say we show these stiff shirts a thing or two about dancing?"

The Doctor, being slightly less inebriated than his partner, resisted the urge to lean in to her body and deftly took a step backwards.

"An excellent idea, my love, but you're forgetting something. I am not old. I'm just... mature."

Donna snorted. "You keep telling yourself that, mate, the fact remains you're cradle snatching by at least 860 years."

The Doctor growled playfully. "You'll pay for that, you cheeky wench!"

She smirked and dragged him back out onto the dance floor.

"Oh, I'm looking forward to it."

Hours later, the couple made their way back to their ship, giggling and leaning heavily on one another. As they burst through the blue wooden doors, the Doctor released his hold on Donna to dance an impromptu little jig and announce "I love the 1920's!" Unfortunately, deprived of his steadying presence, Donna promptly fell to the ground. She sat there for a minute, with both of them in silence, before they simultaneously burst into hysterical laughter.

Wiping away a tear, the Doctor reached out a hand and helped his lover to her feet. Then, without warning, he picked her up and slung her over his shoulder. She shrieked with laughter and pounded on his back. "What are you doing, you moron?"

He replied in a suggestive tone "You, my dear, need taking in hand. Come on, off to bed with you."

He patted her rear in a proprietary way and set off down the hallway at a jog, chuckling salaciously.

Donna dreamed.

She lay on a cold, hard surface, a blinding white light stabbing at her eyes. It was only when she tried to move that she realized she was restrained. It was at this moment that a face which looked like it was made of every nightmare she had ever had invaded her field of vision. Large, calloused hands slid up her thighs and over her belly. Long, jagged fingernails dug into her skin. She felt the rock hard horror of the creature's arousal pressing insistently into her groin- and woke up screaming.

The Doctor, having felt her distress telepathically, was awake and waiting for her. Without hesitation, he pulled her into his arms and began to stroke her hair and hum softly, waiting for her to calm down. Finally, her heart rate slowed and her respiratory bypass disengaged. She took a deep, shuddering breath and relaxed in her lovers embrace. Tears began to stream down her cheeks as she processed the horrific imagery of her dream.

Rocking her gently, the Doctor spoke.

"There now, love, are you back with me?"

Donna nodded with her head still pressed against his chest.

"Do you want to tell me about it?" He asked gently, requesting rather than demanding.

Donna took another breath to steady herself and began to describe her nightmare. When she had finished, the Doctor looked at her thoughtfully, his brow furrowed.

"Have you ever had dreams like this before?"

She shook her head. "No, never. Why?"

"No real reason, it's just that..."

"Just that what, Doctor? I won't have you hiding things from me!"

He was quick to reassure her. "No, really, it's probably nothing; it's just that what you described sounds a lot like external psychic input. I'm not sure that was your dream."


	4. Conversations

"What do you mean; you're not sure it was my dream? Who else's could it have been?"

Donna's tone was one of anger, but the Doctor could detect the tell-tale tremor which meant that she was disguising her fear and concern. He placed his hands on her shoulders and held her gaze.

"It's alright Donna. You're safe."

"Stop avoiding the question, spaceman."

The Doctor grinned sheepishly. "Can't get anything past you, can I? The thing is Donna; you're a Time Lady now."

"Yes, I know. What of it?" Her impatience was starting to show.

"Well, in order for you to receive such detailed images, whoever was sending them would have to be broadcasting on a very specific wavelength, for lack of a better word. If you were still human, it could have been anything, flotsam and jetsam floating around on the psychic plane. As it is, this would seem to suggest... But no, it's impossible. Unless... No, it can't be. It can't!"

Donna sandwiched his face between her hands and forced him to look directly at her. "Doctor. What is it?"

Reluctantly and still disbelieving, he answered "It's... It would have to be... Another Time Lord."

Donna's voice took on a sympathetic tone "That's impossible, my love, you know it is."

"Well, that's the thing. It's not. At least, not completely. There was this one time..."

The look on his face was one Donna recognized. It was the same one he wore when he talked about the Time War, or about any of the people he had loved and lost.

"What happened, sweetheart?"

"Donna I... I can't. I just can't. Please don't make me talk about it." His voice broke as he begged her, and his eyes grew suspiciously bright. Donna felt her hearts constrict in her chest at the obvious anguish her lover was experiencing. Making a decision, she scooted herself backwards so that she was propped up against the head of the bed and held out her arms to him.

"Come here, love."

Once the Doctor was happily nestled in into her arms, she pulled away a little so that she could look him in the eye and said "I understand if you don't want to talk about what happened, my love, but I think it's important that I know. We need to get this dream thing figured out. So… can you show me instead?" She reached out and brushed his left temple with her fingertips.

The Doctor returned her gesture reflexively, but drew his hand back reluctantly. "I... Donna, are you sure? These memories, they're not... pleasant."

She brought her other hand up to rest on his right temple and gazed unflinchingly into his eyes.

"I'm sure."

When he still made no move, Donna rolled her eyes and gave a mental _push_, immersing herself in his memories.

Images flashed through her mind, almost too quickly to comprehend; until she reached a seething morass of memories tinged with red and all somehow focused around one word, 'Master'.

With mounting horror, she watched as her lover and best friend was tortured, humiliated and abused by the man who was once his childhood playmate, his first love. She wept with him for the boy the Master had been- gentle, loving Koschei, who had died the day the Master was born.

Looking further back, Donna saw how the Master had escaped the Time War by disguising himself as a human- a disguise so thorough that he had even fooled himself. She saw how Martha Jones had inadvertently caused him to open the watch containing his Time Lord consciousness. She saw how he had stolen the TARDIS and used her to create a horrifying paradox allowing for the literal decimation of the human race. She felt the Doctor's pain as he listened helplessly to his ship's mental screams as she was mutilated. She felt his guilt at what he had asked Martha to do for the sake of the world. She felt his anguish when his one-time lover refused to regenerate out of pure spite.

Pulling herself out of his mind with a gasp, Donna saw that the Doctor was sitting hunched over with his head bowed, his shoulders shaking with silent sobs.

Wordlessly, she pulled him into her arms and began to stroke his wild hair soothingly. Upon finding himself safe and warm in his lover's embrace, the Doctor released his tenuous self-control and began to cry in earnest, heaving, ragged sobs shaking his slender frame and tears streaming down his cheeks as he clutched Donna desperately, pressing his face into the side of her neck.

Donna was crying too, the horror and tragedy of what had befallen her lover having broken through her considerable reserve. She hid her tears from him, knowing that he would only blame himself for them. When she felt that he was beginning to calm, she sniffed surreptitiously and wiped her face on her sleeve.

Pulling back from her, the Doctor sniffed mightily and said "Sorry."

Donna whacked him lightly on the forehead. "That's the last time I want to hear you apologize for showing your emotions. Out there, you can pretend it doesn't hurt, you can be the Oncoming Storm lord the Lonely God or whatever it is you're calling yourself now, but not here. Not with me. Please."

He smiled softly, amazed that this wonderful, understanding and forgiving woman had chosen to be with him in spite of his flaws, in spite of all the terrible things he'd done. "Thank you, my love."

She smiled back at him "Anytime."

The next morning, Donna and the Doctor awoke refreshed, both of them feeling quite content after their late-night communion. They sat facing each other across the kitchen table, each with their hands wrapped around a hot mug of strong tea. Taking a fortifying sip of her beverage, Donna spoke.

"So, whoever it was that sent me that dream" _Nightmare_, she corrected mentally "do you really think they could be a Time Lord?"

The Doctor closed his eyes briefly before answering "It's entirely possible, assuming anyone else managed to escape the way... well, to escape, at any rate. The problem with that theory is that I seriously doubt that anyone else would have tried. They were all so loyal, so obedient. I can't imagine that they would have even wanted to desert Gallifrey."

"Well they can't all have been like that, look at you" Donna teased him "Surely there must have been others."

"Well, maybe." The Doctor admitted reluctantly. "I certainly didn't know everyone on the planet."

"Either way, we have to find them. Surely anything powerful enough to fool us into thinking it's a Time Lord is worth as much attention as an actual Time Lord?"

"True."

Donna stood, pushing her chair backwards with a squeal. "Well then, skinny boy, we'd better get cracking, hadn't we?"

"Indeed we had. Come on then, Donna, allonsy!"

The two of them walked briskly from the kitchen to the console room, which had been placed conveniently across the hall. The Doctor sent a wordless thank you to the TARDIS for accommodating the urgency of their mission. As they approached the centre console, Donna asked "Will she be able to get a location from the psychic imprint of my dream, or do we need more information?"

"No, the dream should definitely be enough, with the amount of power it had behind it. She's a clever old girl. Aren't you? Yes you are!" He stroked one of the coral beams before giving it an exaggerated kiss. Donna rolled her eyes.

"Sometimes I think you like your ship more than you like me."

The Doctor wrapped one arm around the pillar and embraced Donna with the other. "I love _our_ ship exactly as much as I love you, and she loves both of us. Don't you girl?"

The background humming of the TARDIS increased in pitch and volume until it sounded almost like a purr, and Donna melted.

"Aww, and I love you both too. So much." She gave the Doctor a quick peck on the lips and the TARDIS a vigorous pat. "Now, let's get this show on the road."

She moved over to the other side of the console and placed both her hands on a flattened area of coral which had presented itself rather conveniently when she had realized that she would need to enter into full telepathic communion with the ship. Reaching out mentally, she expanded her link with the ship until she was fully immersed in her consciousness.

Connecting with the TARDIS felt a little strange, but right somehow, Donna decided. The ship's mental landscape was utterly different from anything she had experienced before- massive and all-encompassing with little to no understanding of the passage of time. She felt herself falling, spiralling, buffeted by currents and eddies in the vastness in which she found herself. Before she had time to feel afraid, something caught her, steadied her and set her down on a solid surface.

Opening her eyes, Donna found herself in a small, comfortably furnished parlour room, complete with an open fire and pleasantly squashy looking couches. Seated rather primly in an armchair by the fire was a stately woman in a royal blue silk robe, cinched at the waist with a wide silver sash. She wore her dark, curly hair pinned up in a style which would have been elegant, had it not been in the process of springing loose.

As Donna took in her surroundings, the woman leapt from her seat and ran across the room to embrace her. The air was forcibly expelled from her lungs as the blue-silver-black whirlwind slammed into her. As she struggled to catch her breath, the woman babbled excitedly "Goodbye! No. Sorry. Hello! It's you! You're here! It's been so long since anyone came to visit me, and now you're here and you're going to find her and bring her home and oh, I've been looking forward to this so much!"

Finally regaining her ability to speak, Donna interrupted hurriedly "Sorry, what? Who are you? I'm supposed to be talking to the TARDIS. And what do you mean 'find her'? Find who?"

The other woman giggled. "I am the TARDIS, silly! As to the other..." She bit her lip "I can't tell you. Don't worry, you'll find out soon enough."

As much as Donna hated to be kept in the dark, she knew that foreknowledge could be particularly dangerous in a case like this one, and accepted that the TARDIS knew what she was doing.

"Okay then, I need to give you the psychic imprint of the dream I had. Er... how are we going to do this?"

"Oh, don't worry about that. I've got it already. Really, you bipeds are so easy to read. I've extrapolated the space-time co-ordinates; just get Himself out there to pilot us to the set destination."

As the room around her began to fade, Donna heard the TARDIS call out "and tell him to stop hitting me with that damned mallet!"

Donna opened her eyes in the console room to find the Doctor pacing nervously. As soon as he saw that she'd come back to herself, he ran over and wrapped himself around her, clinging like a limpet. "You were gone _ages_."

"Oh, don't be a child. I wasn't more than ten minutes, you big dumbo."

"Felt longer to me." He mumbled. "So, what did she say? Did she get the co-ordinates?"

Gently extricating herself from his arms, Donna answered "She's got them, they're entered and set, all you have to do is fly there."

"HaHA, excellent! Well done old girl!"

As the Doctor began to whiz around the console, pulling levers and flicking switches, Donna remembered something "and she says to stop hitting her!"


End file.
